142 Martial Arts Girl Long Zhirou

"Hostess, just look at how long it has been since your last update."

"Drinking without alcohol lacks all the fun."

"I thought it was going to be a duel of longspears, and it actually turned out to be a duel of longspears? Is that it??"

"Just hack at the spear shaft directly. Break the spear, can a stick possibly be superior to a long sword?"

"To the person above, hacking at what? Just grab the spear shaft right away."

"Using a spear and only knowing how to thrust, parrying and holding are completely missing."

"It must be a choreographed routine, the coordination is quite decent."

"Pay attention to the progress bar."

...

These comments were from the first half when Shi Dong and Yang Huaming were sparring. The bullet chats were fairly standard, with a mix of commentary and skepticism. With the internet being so developed nowadays, many people have never practiced martial arts themselves, yet they have seen plenty and can always manage to make a few remarks.

"Boss Du has also appeared."

"Is that a Japanese devil on the opposite side? The starting posture and anime movements look quite similar."

"Incoming high-energy moment!!"

"What the heck... was this sped up? I blinked once and they were already done fighting?"

"Woc~woc~ did that stick pierce right into the cement ground?"

"Fake at first glance. A wooden stick piercing cement ground? The wooden stick would definitely break first."

"Absolute powerhouse!!!"

...

Regarding the part where Du Ruo made his entrance, there was actually even more skepticism. Most people were just watching for the spectacle, and coupled with the abundance of fake videos nowadays, netizens possessed a very high resistance to these things.

However, the video was still shared quite a bit. Many netizens, eager to see some excitement, forwarded these videos to various debunking bloggers, asking them to verify their authenticity.

Generally speaking, the video view count was probably not bad. Although it didn't generate as much buzz as the video of Xiang Yuanyuan drinking, it was still not too shabby.

Du Ruo took a look, found no useful information, simply gave it a like, and then exited directly, paying no more attention to the video.

During his bout with Saburo Inoue, Du Ruo had indeed displayed such strength: the speed of his spear thrusts, the force of his parries, and the velocity and power of his piercing strikes, even though Du Ruo hadn't unleashed his "Qi."

Based on this strength alone, it was more than enough to look down upon the masses with pride. Yet in the eyes of those watching the video, surprisingly no one felt shocked or suspicious.

Perhaps some were shocked or skeptical, but their reactions were diluted by the subsequent comments. One can only imagine how unreliable the internet is nowadays.

Smashing bricks and wrenches is considered child's play; women lifting several cubic meters of solid wood by themselves is a common occurrence, and there are even delicate-skinned women who bare-handedly twist deformed steel bars. One can easily imagine that nowadays, Du Ruo's few moves online simply fail to impress.

Du Ruo closed the video and was just about to study for a while when a video call came through.

"Little brother, you're at home."

The video call was sent by Du Na. Judging by the looks of it, they were still at the shop in town.

"Yeah. Didn't you guys say you were going on a trip? Have you not left yet, or have you already come back?"

Du Ruo found it a bit baffling. He had already taken a trip to Zhejiang and stayed there for a few days, and afterwards he even went to see the Yangtze alligators—how was it that his sister was still making a video call from home today?

No wonder he hadn't seen any posts from his sister in his Moments over the past few days; it turned out they hadn't left yet.

"Your brother-in-law just finished getting busy. We booked a flight for the afternoon. Since you happen to be at home, here's the deal: take Mao Mao with you for a few days. It's inconvenient to bring it along on our trip."

Du Na said through the video screen.

"How long are you guys going for? I might not necessarily have time; I'm also looking for a place to go travel."

Du Ruo frowned. Taking care of dogs and kids was the most annoying thing ever—of course, if he didn't have to bathe them, didn't have to prepare meals, didn't have to sleep with them at night, and only had to play with them, it would be fine.

"We're going for a week, and you'll only have to take care of it for a day or two. Mom and the others will be back in a couple of days, and if you don't want to keep watching it by then, you can just send it over to them."

Du Na clearly understood Du Ruo and had already made arrangements.

"Alright then."

Only then did Du Ruo nod.

"That's settled, then. I'll send Mao Mao over to you in a bit, and I'll ship you some wild mushrooms to eat later, okay?"

Upon hearing Du Ruo agree, Du Na immediately beamed with joy.

In less than half an hour, Mao Mao was delivered over. During this time, Yaya reluctantly said her goodbyes, and by the way, took away the small dried fish Du Ruo kept in the refrigerator.

...

"Du Ruo~ Du Ruo~~"

After lunch, while Du Ruo was studying under the blast of the air conditioner, Xiang Yuanyuan's loud voice rang out from outside the courtyard.

"What is it?"

Du Ruo put down his phone, walked up to the window to take a look, and saw Xiang Yuanyuan standing outside the courtyard holding something.

"Let's go down to the river to set the fish traps. I just bought some. Are you going or not?"

Xiang Yuanyuan waved her arms happily, her face full of excitement.

"Not going, go by yourself. I'll assign a bodyguard for you—Mao Mao, come on, go along and have some fun."

The weather was quite hot, and Du Ruo had no interest in baking in the sun. However, he did pat Mao Mao on the rump; dogs actually required a fairly large amount of daily exercise to stay healthy, and since Du Ruo didn't want to walk the dog, he simply let Xiang Yuanyuan walk it along the way.

He just hadn't expected that Xiang Yuanyuan would actually take a liking to this sort of thing and even go buy fish traps herself.

Not long after Mao Mao followed Xiang Yuanyuan out, Du Ruo quickly found himself busy with other matters.

Guests started arriving at the front desk, and Du Ruo needed to go over and lend a hand.

These past few days, tourists had started booking rooms again, and the guesthouse was once again packed to capacity.

The summer intern seemed to have some personal matters and had asked for leave today, requiring Du Ruo to step in and help manage things so the work could run smoothly.

When Du Ruo arrived at the front desk, Yang Ling was right in the middle of welcoming a group of four.

"Boss, you came at the right time. I'll take them to their rooms, you watch the front desk for a moment."

Seeing Du Ruo approach, Yang Ling immediately made arrangements.

"Alright, go ahead."

Du Ruo didn't have any objections to this. Yang Ling was genuinely conscientious and responsible when it came to her work, handling everything in an orderly fashion and never calling Du Ruo unless it was absolutely unavoidable.

Of course, this was also related to Du Ruo delegating authority; otherwise, if one were to truly manage the guesthouse meticulously, there would be no way Du Ruo could enjoy his current level of ease.

To put it bluntly, running a guesthouse actually involved quite a few disgusting incidents. Some people would try to get freebies, finding all sorts of fault after staying and leaving bad reviews online; others would resort to various tricks to exploit loopholes upon arrival, or break the furniture, or vomit everywhere while drunk.

Guests would get into conflicts with each other, and sometimes families traveling together would start quarreling over a single careless remark, even escalating to physical fights and turning the entire guesthouse upside down.

All sorts of bizarre incidents constantly popped up, and it was only thanks to Yang Ling's wealth of experience that she could always manage to smooth things over.

She would only call Du Ruo for instructions when financial compensation was required.

It was safe to say that without Yang Ling, let alone practicing martial arts, he probably would have been driven so mad by these trivial matters that all his hair would have fallen out.

Du Ruo had already decided to give Yang Ling a raise; regardless of the amount, it was a form of recognition, and it was still much better than the day Yang Ling decided to quit and leave him scrambling to find someone else.

Du Ruo sat at the front desk, his mind drifting with various thoughts while his fingers unconsciously clicked on the front desk computer, checking the room reservation system or replying to inquiries from people wanting to book rooms online.

"Hello, I booked a room here and I'm here to check in now."

Just as Du Ruo was in a daze, two figures walked in from outside. Seeing Du Ruo sitting at the front desk, they walked over to make inquiries.

"Oh, please tell me the last four digits of the phone number used for the booking, and also provide your ID cards. Are the two of you checking in together? I'll need the ID cards for both of you."

Du Ruo raised his head and glanced over. Standing across from him were two young women, neither looking very old, both in their early twenties.

One of them was carrying a backpack and holding a tripod with a mobile phone mounted on it; she looked like she must be a videographer.

The other woman was quite striking, dressed in a simple white jacket with her hair tied in a single ponytail, exuding a spirited and valiant aura. With long limbs and a straight back, Du Ruo could tell at a glance that this woman either practiced martial arts or dance—her temperament was exceptionally refined.

It looked like these two likely consisted of a live streamer and her assistant-cum-cameraman.

"The last four digits are 0666, and these are our IDs. We booked the room three days ago."

The woman took out two ID cards and placed them on the front desk, though as she spoke, she cast a few extra glances at Du Ruo.

"Alright, just a moment."

Du Ruo checked the system; they had booked a detached villa, and quite coincidentally, it was the exact same one Du Ruo used to live in.

As for these two women, the pretty one was named Long Zhirou, and the other one didn't matter.

However, Du Ruo didn't pay excessive attention to either of them. Long Zhirou had indeed grown up to be a beauty, but purely in terms of facial features, she still fell a bit short compared to Li Qiyao, who possessed a far more enchanting and alluring charm.

And when it came to figures, Du Ruo felt that among the women he had seen in his thirty-odd years, Xiang Yuanyuan definitely had the best physique. After all, someone who could single-handedly boost the business of the village tavern and guesthouse purely based on her figure possessed an exceptional physique indeed—not to mention that Xiang Yuanyuan was also quite pretty, it was just that her figure was so eye-catching that her facial appearance seemed less important by comparison.

Therefore, Du Ruo didn't stare for long. He simply compared them against their ID cards, checked that the detached room was marked as vacant, and noted that the housekeeping auntie had cleaned it an hour ago.

With lightning-fast speed, Du Ruo completed the check-in process for the two of them.

"Over that way, the detached villa. It's right diagonally across from the little tavern, very easy to recognize. You guys can just head over."

Du Ruo handed the room card to them and pointed in the right direction. Seeing that they weren't carrying any heavy luggage or anything, he couldn't be bothered to lead them over personally.

"Could you trouble yourself to show us the way? You can also introduce us to the local food and spots around here along the way."

Long Zhirou took the items, smiled at Du Ruo, and instead of leaving immediately, started chatting him up.

"?"

Du Ruo didn't move; instead, he looked up at her. Du Ruo didn't believe in the unprovoked enthusiasm of a pretty woman, so he remained still, merely studying her.

"Hehe, you're Boss Du from the tavern hostess's video, aren't you? I'm your fan. I've watched your videos; your Xingyi Quan is amazing, and I also watched the longspear duel the hostess uploaded today. You are so awesome, I never expected I'd run into you here."

Long Zhirou looked at Du Ruo. Initially, she had only thought he looked somewhat familiar, but after pulling up the video on her phone to verify, her eyes had lit up, gazing at Du Ruo as if he were her idol.